Disciple of War (Art of the Adept Book 4)

by Michael G. Manning

  He closed one fist and exerted his will. What Tailtiu was doing wasn’t a spell, rather it was a form of wild magic, but even so it collapsed instantly. The vines that had already formed lost cohesion and dropped to the ground, while Tailtiu’s turyn dissipated like smoke in a strong wind. “Don’t do that again,” he warned.

  Tailtiu’s eyes widened in surprise, and her tongue darted out to move across her lips. “Such strength!” she sighed loudly. “I can scarcely contain myself.” Her hands began to move, one up and across her chest, while the other migrated downward in a sinuous motion.

  Will responded instantly, “Don’t do that either.”

  Mercifully, Tailtiu stopped immediately. Turning sincere eyes toward him, she asked, “Why?”

  Not another moral lesson, he groaned inwardly. How do I explain this to her? After a second, he settled on the easiest answer. “It makes me uncomfortable.”

  She frowned. “It shouldn’t.” Then she glanced at Janice and Tiny. “And I think it would help inspire them. They need an example.”

  “No, they don’t. They’ll work things out in their own time—when they’re ready. Forcing others to watch you put your own pleasure on display is another form of violence.”

  “That makes no sense. They’d still enjoy it,” argued the fae woman.

  “And it would still be violence. There are many ways to hurt people and most of them are not necessarily obvious.”

  “You humans are too confusing. How am I supposed to know?”

  Will was perplexed for a moment too. I was born and raised a mortal and I still have trouble figuring things out. How is a creature as alien as Tailtiu supposed to understand? He gave the only answer he could think of. “You have to ask. Humans are complicated, and no two of us are exactly alike. In general, though, if you haven’t asked, don’t do it.”

  His aunt stared at him pensively for several seconds. “I’ll ask then.”

  She turned to do just that, but Will stopped her. “I’m here too, and I don’t want to see that.” Liar! screamed a voice in the back of his mind, but he ignored it. “I have a more urgent issue.”

  “Tell me what you need—master.” Tailtiu bowed her head demurely, as if she hadn’t just been overtly defiant just moments before.

  I hate it when she does that, thought Will. “I need your speed, stealth, and acute powers of observation. I’m not sure whether my army is east or west of here, and just as importantly, I need to know the location and strength of any enemies in the region.”

  “That’s easy,” said his aunt, pointing across the river. “You left your army north of here just yesterday.”

  “Not that part. I split my forces. Some of them went eastward when we went north.”

  “Ahh, I see,” she responded. “Easy enough. Watch me change.” She stretched languidly as she said it.

  “There’s no need for that,” said Will, glancing away.

  “To learn!” said his aunt. “You’ve learned other things. Shapeshifting is very useful. You may as well observe me.” She winked at him when he reluctantly looked back. “Besides, if you do learn it, the possibilities are endless!” Before he could protest, her flesh began to flow like water, though slower than usual.

  He watched, realizing she was deliberately trying to help, but he found the sight disturbing. Eventually she finished, and a huge owl stood where she had been. As he had learned from older conversations, adding mass was easier than subtracting. When she became a bear or deer, Tailtiu created a type of false flesh from pure turyn, but when she became a bird, she retained her usual size and adjusted the wing and body proportions accordingly. It was a good thing she had such a small frame, otherwise flight would have been difficult.

  Seconds later, she shot into the air and began winging her way out of sight, remaining close to the tops of the trees. Janice dismissed her force spell and she and Tiny stepped apart. Both of them were blushing.

  “You see why I said she was dangerous,” said Will.

  Janice was fanning herself with one hand, though the weather wasn’t particularly warm. “Oh, yes. Definitely.” She seemed distracted.

  “Is everything all right?” asked Will, looking at both his friends. Tiny’s expression was particularly serious.

  Janice nodded. “I’m fine. No problem at all, though I think John—”

  “Janice!” groaned Tiny, his face growing redder. “Please.” He turned away and made a show of going to check on his horse.

  “I wasn’t going to say anything,” she called in his direction, then her eyes darted back to Will. There was a mixture of embarrassment and mischief in them.

  “What?” whispered Will quietly.

  “It was nothing to be embarrassed about,” she said softly. “I think he just needed to pee.”

  Will frowned. “I doubt that. We stopped just before we crossed the river.”

  She gave him an intense look, indicating he might be dense. “Remember, last year? When I woke you and you had pee?”

  “Oh.” Then his eyes shot wide. “Oh!” It had been a particularly embarrassing moment for him and was one of his friends’ favorite stories to recount. Unable to help himself, Will began to chuckle.

  “Not a word, Will,” growled Tiny from the other side of Thunderturnip. “Not one word, you hear me?”

  Will held his hands up, his face showing nothing but innocence. “I didn’t say anything!”

  Tiny stared at him for half a minute, then went back to using the curry comb on his mount.

  “It’s a perfectly natural thing anyway,” said Will nonchalantly, before an evil grin spread across his face. “Nothing to be flustered about. Happens to everyone sooner or later.”

  An inarticulate noise emerged from the big man’s throat and he came around Thunderturnip with murder in his eyes. Will laughed and began to run, leading Tiny in circles around Janice and the horses.

  It was good that he had always been faster than his friend.

  Chapter 42

  Tiny was a large man, and strong as he was, his endurance wouldn’t allow him to chase Will indefinitely. Eventually, he had to rest. He stopped, hands on his knees, while Will grinned at him from the other side of the horses. “You’ll have to sleep eventually,” he panted. “That’s when I’ll get you.”

  Janice sighed, rolling her eyes. “That’s enough of that. Aren’t you hungry? We haven’t eaten since yesterday.”

  Will summoned a loaf of bread and held it up. “Truce?”

  The big man eyed him warily, then finally relaxed. “Damn you for being a sly one, beguiling me with your fancy bread.”

  “Better that than a backside surprise, eh?” said Will, unable to help himself. Tiny let out a shout, and Will tossed the bread to Janice, ready to run again. He took two steps, before she stepped into his path and thrust her foot into his legs, tripping him.

  Will went down hard, scraping his chin. He stared up at Janice, shocked by the treachery, then Tiny loomed over him, cracking his knuckles. Will held his hands up in a gesture of surrender.

  Janice interrupted, “Go ahead and give him some lumps if you want. He probably deserves it—but—if you want some of this bread, you’ll sit down and make peace, otherwise I’ll see to it that you don’t get a single bite.”

  Tiny groaned, obviously distressed by the dilemma.

  Will piped up then. “Actually, I can do better than the bread. I have steaks we can fry up.”

  Tiny swallowed. “You’re bluffing. We can’t make a fire. The smoke would give us away and we don’t know where the enemy is.”

  He wiggled his fingers. “You know me. Do you really think I haven’t spent a little time learning spells for cooking in situations like this?”

  His large friend was still suspicious. “You wouldn’t cheat like that. You prefer cooking the regular way.”

  “It’s hardly a cheat, just a spell to heat up a stone so I can cook without a fire,” explained Will. When he saw Tiny’s eyes glancing around to see if a suitable stone
might be nearby, he added, “I brought the stone as well. It’s easier than hunting for one each time.”

  “This better be good,” warned Tiny.

  Will grinned. “Trust me.” He produced a large, flat stone from the limnthal and then brought out a flat iron pan. To that he added a large knob of butter. Using a spell to heat the stone, he set the pan on it to melt the butter while he peeled and minced some garlic. With salt, pepper, and a quarter hours’ time, Will had three steaks ready that he would have been proud to serve anywhere.

  Tiny moaned as he took the first buttery bite, then looked gratefully at Will. “You’re the best friend I could have ever asked for.”

  “I love you too, my friend,” Will responded sincerely.

  Janice watched them in disbelief, her plate still untouched in her lap. “So that’s all it takes? A piece of meat?”

  “You know what they say about the way to a man’s heart,” Will reminded, giving her a wink. “They aren’t wrong. You might want to think about upping your culinary skills, lest I steal him out from under your nose.”

  “Hmm. Is that so, John?” she asked.

  Tiny replied around his latest mouthful of meat, “You haven’t tasted it yet, so you’re are as yet ignorant of the delights upon your plate. You should be grateful he even cooked one for you after what you did.”

  Janice looked askance at him. “What did I do?”

  Tiny clucked reproachfully. “Tripping a friend like that isn’t very nice.”

  “You were the one who wanted to wallop him!”

  “An honest walloping,” countered Tiny. “He knew I was after him. What you did was a sneaky betrayal.” Looking at her plate, he asked, “Are you going to eat that?”

  Janice glared back at him. “Unbelievable.” Then she finally took her first bite of the steak on her plate. An inarticulate sound of pleasure escaped her mouth as she began to chew.

  Tiny pointed his knife in her direction. “See?”

  Looking at Will, Janice entreated him. “Marry me, Will.”

  Tiny got up and moved to sit between them. “Too late. I found him first.”

  “Just so everyone knows, I’m already married. Remember?” said Will.

  Janice finished her first mouthful and began confidently chewing her second bite. “First or not, you don’t have a chance. I’m prettier. Right, Will?”

  “I’m not answering that one,” said Will quickly.

  Tiny slapped his thigh. “He prefers ‘em big and meaty. A scrawny little bird like you wouldn’t be enough for him.”

  The food was good, and all three of them were soon laughing. The mood might have remained good, but soon after they finished eating, Tailtiu returned. Janice created another force-dome, though Will noticed she gave herself and Tiny a little more room this time.

  “Something smells good,” said his aunt when her transformation was complete.

  “What did you find?” Will asked.

  Tailtiu pointed west. “There’s no one in that direction.” Then she pointed east, in the direction of the road that led to Myrsta. “The enemy is hiding over that way, just a few miles from here in the woods close to the road. Beyond that are some of your soldiers, and farther on I think I caught hints of even more enemies, but I didn’t go far enough to see.”

  Will frowned. “I thought they had broken out past the enemy to their rear.”

  Tailtiu shrugged. “They’re not aware of the enemy on this side of them.”

  “Why not?”

  “They’re hiding. The trees are too thin, so they’ve cloaked themselves with a strange mixture of illusion and death magic.”

  “Death magic?”

  “I’m not sure what you call it. The poisonous sort that demons use. I don’t really understand how it works, but the effects are simple enough. They’re killing the plants and trees nearby and using the energy to fuel a persistent illusion that hides their soldiers.”

  It was then that Will noticed something moving near her feet. It looked to be a piece of brown cloth, but after a few seconds he recognized it as a canvas bag. “What’s that?”

  Tailtiu lifted the sack with one hand, then fished around in it with the other before drawing out a furry, wiggling mass. Small whimpers and a pink tongue confirmed the creature’s identity. It was a small white and brown puppy, somewhere around ten weeks of age. The fae woman held it up by the scruff, eyeing it clinically before settling it more comfortably in the crook of her arm. “This is Dinner,” she announced.

  “No, it’s a dog,” corrected Will. “Why do you have a puppy?”

  She sneered at him. “I know what it is, and obviously you weren’t listening. I just told you what I plan to do with it.” Tailtiu deftly slipped the small canine back into the sack.

  Will felt sick at the thought. “You can’t do that. Where did you find it?”

  His aunt shrugged. “I spotted it in the bushes beside the road a few miles from here. Some fool dropped his food, but his loss is my gain.”

  “We don’t eat dogs,” he reiterated.

  “Then you’re fools. Do you have any idea how tasty mortal flesh is? You’re lucky I don’t eat you.”

  “The accord—”

  “Only pertains to humans,” she said, cutting him off. “Not that it’s really a problem for me anymore, either way. As I said, you’re very fortunate that I haven’t decided to eat you.”

  “You aren’t eating that puppy,” Will said, his tone that of a warning. “That’s an order.”

  Tailtiu stared at him in surprise. “You’re serious? I’m here to provide you with help and assistance and you want to steal my rightful prize?”

  “Dogs are friends, not food.”

  “Fine,” she agreed, waving a hand to prevent him from starting a speech. Lifting the sack, she walked toward Janice and Tiny within their defensive dome. “I’ll just leave it over here and you can sort things out after we’re done.”

  Will started to relax, but as soon as she had put some distance between them, he felt the turyn in the area shift. Mist started to envelop them, but Will dismantled the wild magic before it could get far. Unfortunately, though, that gave his aunt plenty of time to create even more space between them. Even on two legs, she was almost as fleet as a deer. Within seconds, she was thirty yards away, and then her form shifted, and a winged owl was flying away, a puppy-filled sack dangling from her talons.

  “Damn it!” he yelled in frustration.

  Janice lowered her force-dome. “Was that a puppy?”

  Will explained what had happened, and both his friends seemed disgusted by the story, but their thoughts regarding his reaction were slightly different. While Tiny felt he’d acted appropriately; Janice was less enthused.

  “You realize you just drove off our most powerful ally,” she informed him.

  Tiny stared at her. “It was a puppy, Jan.” Will was surprised to hear his friend shorten Janice’s name; it spoke of an even greater familiarity between them than he had realized was there.

  “Is that more important than the lives of our soldiers?” she asked, raising one brow. When Tiny stared at her in horror, she amended her statement. “Look. I’m not saying Will should have let her have the puppy, but couldn’t he have waited to confront her over it until after he had finished finding out everything she had seen?”

  Will sat down, resting his chin on his hands. “I didn’t think she’d just run. She’s always listened to me before.”

  Tiny still seemed upset. “We don’t negotiate with people who eat puppies, Jan. There’s a lot of gray areas in this world and few things are black and white, but eating puppies is evil. Children and mothers are sacred, even if they aren’t human.”

  Will decided to move on. “I do wish I’d gotten more information first, but given what we know—”

  “Do you think I’m a proponent of sacrificing children?” demanded Janice, who was obviously more hurt by Tiny’s last words than Will had realized. “I’m not, but I am an adult, John, and som
etimes adults have to be practical when it comes to their priorities.”

  Tiny nodded along with an air of agitation. “And children are always the first priority.”

  “It was a dog,” she replied in exasperation.

  Tiny glared at her. “It was just a dog? Really?”

  “I didn’t say ‘just,’” she corrected. “And I didn’t say we shouldn’t do anything, but clearly it wasn’t the most important thing to consider at the time.”

  The big man’s face was turning red, but Will stood up before he could reply. “I need you two to shut the hell up!” Both of them started to speak, but Will smothered their voices with his new talent. A tense silence followed, into which he spoke, “Tiny, go sit down over there until you cool off.” He pointed to one side of their makeshift camp, then he looked at Janice. “You go over there. I don’t want to hear any more from either of you for a few minutes. I need to think.” Angry tears were starting to well in her eyes, but he ignored them.

  They’re like two lovesick teenagers, thought Will. Letting their emotions and something stupid derail everything else. He was certain he and Selene had never been so foolish. Selene was far too pragmatic for such silliness.

  His thoughts solidified quickly. Sometimes the best thing to do wasn’t spending time trying to find the perfect solution—sometimes the best thing was simply to act quickly based on what you already knew. So far, it seemed to frequently be that way in war. Will lifted his voice. “Second and Sixth will get here in three days if we do nothing, but that isn’t good enough. I need them here tomorrow, but I’m going to have to settle for the day after since that just isn’t physically possible.”

  “What are you thinking then?” asked Janice.

  “You will ride back at speed and let Lambel and Hargast know they need to move even faster. I’ll find a way to warn the First, so they don’t run headfirst into the ambush. If they delay by a day, it will give Second and Sixth time to get here. Then we can reverse the ambush.”